I don’t know why those who think that the disengagement is bad and the security barrier is bad don’t understand that if Israel can extricate itself from this mess in the territories, its economy would benefit tremendously and grow again.

In the meantime, it is slowly but surely destroying lives.

The United Nations Children Fund study of 25 countries found that Denmark and Finland have the lowest child poverty rates (2.4 and 2.8 percent, respectively) and Mexico and the United States have the highest – 27.7 and 21.9 percent. In Israel, the rate of poor children in 2003 was 30.8 percent

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themiddle

12 Comments

  • Still deluded.

    The price of the retreat plan keeps rising and rising a now estimated at seven billion shekels, with no roof in sight. The economy is finally improving, unemployment is dropping and all signs show that there is absolutely now reason for this plan to proceed on the argument of ‘good for the economy’.

    Just as we get out of the mud, billions of shekels will have to be cut from the budget to pay for this insane plan. Every ministry will have to take huge cuts, and while the army will have to stop buying and reparing equipment to pay it’s share, the education ministry will be hit hard as well as other transfer payments (like the 40% increase Sharon gave to the ultra-orthodox in order to buy their votes).

  • Josh, you forgot about the billions it cost just to put us in there and keep us there. I’m sure you know the expression, “throwing good money after bad…”

  • Peace will be good for Israel’s economy. American and European capital and trade will become more available, Arab trade will become possible, property values will rise, and all boats will be lifted. Peace in combination with the likely possibility of mutiple Arab democracies will be phenomenal for economic growth in the region and particularly for Israeli economic growth.

  • T_M,
    If you’re going to use that “throwing good money after bad…” expression about people’s homes, then what do you think about other ‘failed’ enterprises like;
    -Maalot,
    -Dimona,
    -Yeruham,
    -Netivot,
    -Sderot,
    -Mizpe Ramon,
    -settling the Negev in general.

    How many of these are ancient cities, settled before the Jews were in Gaza/Kfar Darom, or artificial implants on ‘state-owned’ land in the desert country-side?

    Okay,
    Dimona survives because of a certain ‘installation’ in its vicinity as well the workers at the Dead Sea plants, but nonetheless, it and the other ‘development towns’ merely rank at the top of poverty, home foreclosures from defaulted mortgages, unemployment, and ‘illiteracy’. Nonetheless, if you’ve had the chance to visit, you’d see that they at least superficially, very beautiful towns since the national government allots major transfer payments for all infrastructure (property tax alone doesn’t pay for much).

    So, you’re argument is that if money was spent on Gush Katif (and the entire settlement effort, right?) “throwing good money after bad…” , and it’s a failure (that Gush Katif is certainly not, IMO), then that justifies ripping up people’s lives, homes, and cemetaries in other areas of Israel too?

    Okay, using that warped nonchalant and arrogant opinion, please try to justify Yeruham’s existence.

    Founded in 1951, it has gobbled gazillions of shekels in foreign tzedakah, JNF tree planting, parks and roads, personal transfer payments (welfare, unemployment), factory subsidies to entice and keep them in the area, as well as other infrastructure investments. If one factory closes, the city goes deeper into poverty. Why not close it up and move these people elsewhere to stregthen other Negev towns?